


Mourning Sun

by kubotits



Category: Bleach
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/M, Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-11
Updated: 2013-04-11
Packaged: 2017-12-08 03:59:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/756799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kubotits/pseuds/kubotits
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the first several moments of wakeful morning, Isshin forgets that his wife is dead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mourning Sun

**Author's Note:**

> A new one! I'm sorry if you were having a good day. If you really wanna cry I recommend listening to Happiness by The Fray while reading.

For the first several moments of wakeful morning, Isshin forgets that his wife is dead. The morning sun is shining in through the half-drawn curtains in their shared room—his alarm didn't go off, but he decides it must be Sunday. They're closed on Sunday. If it wasn't a Sunday, Masaki would have woken him. Dregs of sleep cling to his eyelids as he tries to blink them out, squinting at the lazy motes of dust floating overhead. When he turns aside, less than awake but getting there, he expects his wife to greet him as she has every morning for the past ten plus years. On her side, her bare shoulder with just a hint of strap from her nightgown peaking out from under the blanket, a drowsy grin and her eyes crinkled; the familiar, groggy “morning,” her beaming face brightening as he awoke. Rare are the days when Isshin is awake before she is, and he treasures those all the more—because she sleeps with her mouth slightly parted, a hand gripping his shirt or a leg between his, and her eyelashes leave long shadows over her cheeks. So placid, so peaceful, she always sleeps on her side to face him. He feels the warmth of her, the mattress dip with her presence. It's her, as it always has been—except when he rolls over, she's not there. It takes him a half-second longer to realize she never will be again.

At least he's not alone in his grief: Isshin could cry with joy over what he finds beside him in place of empty space. His arm is stretched along the width of the bed, his children sound asleep. Little Ichigo is closest, his back nestled against his father's side. One tiny fist reaches out, grasping the cloth of adjacent four year old Yuzu's pajamas. The twins are entwined together, small comfort from an evil they are too young to fully understand.

It had been a long night. Ichigo had been already half-hypothermic by the time a bystander had found a pay phone to call the police, his fists gripping at his dead mother's clothes the way he clings to Yuzu now. They had to pry him from her, his fingers stiff and all but frozen. Ryuuken himself had called when the body reached Karakura General Hospital, with a stricken voice like gravel—“It's Masaki.”

That was all he needed. In a panic he had never experienced in his life, he all but dragged his daughters to the car where he frantically strapped them into their car seats. When they asked what was wrong in their broken little kid-Japanese, he only shook his head, unable to speak, unable to breathe properly.

He rushed through the hospital, toting twins until he could find the day care personnel to pass them onto; they'd been warned of his arrival, taking the girls from him without asking him to sign anything at all. Yuzu began to cry, frightened and confused, and because Yuzu was crying Karin joined in.

“My _son_ ,” Isshin finally choked out over his wailing daughters. “My son, my son.”

“With Doctor Ishida,” one replied.

The worst scenarios came rushing into his head as he tore himself away from his wailing daughters. _No_ , he thought, _Not Ichigo too._ He couldn't lose anymore of his family. He found it disgustingly ironic that his previous job as a “death god” hadn't helped him nor would it allow him to be able to bring back his wife. Isshin had never been a fan of poetic irony.

Gritting his teeth, he moved through the hospital with a slowness acutely reminiscent of nightmares, like running away from something he couldn't outstrip. He couldn't get there fast enough, while the rest of the world around him sped up. The patients, doctors, nurses, they were blurs around him. It was too fast, too much, without her. But he had to focus, he had to move past the pain...past the death of his wife...for _their_ sake.

When he finally reached Ichigo, tunnel vision only focusing on the great shock of orange hair, he fell to his knees, wrapping his arms protectively around him. Ichigo gripped the back of Isshin's shirt, clinging like he had to his mother, sobbing into his daddy's broad shoulder. He was mostly dry, only the ends of his hair still dripped. They had set him up with child-sized hospital smocks and slippers. But he was whole, he was safe, he was okay. Isshin wasn't losing anyone else today. Only when he finally broke away, standing up but keeping his hand on Ichigo's, he noticed Ryuuken.

Isshin's voice was gone again, neither man saying a word.

“Was it?” were the only strangled string of words Isshin could manage.

Ryuuken only nodded solemnly. Isshin's grip on Ichigo's hand was vise-like and in some part of his brain he knew he was hurting him, but Ichigo didn't complain. Isshin looked back down at his son, who was roughly wiping his eyes with the back of his other hand. Ichigo's mouth became a grim slash, the tears replaced with a frown. Oh, his brave, strong son, who Isshin only now realized Masaki died to protect. With that realization, Isshin felt something fill him from his toes to chest: love. His wife, the beautiful, magnificent mother who would risk her life to protect a stranger like she had the day they met, dying to save _their_ _son_.

He sighs, rustling Ichigo's bright orange hair with the breath. His son does not stir. Maybe he knew this day would come, maybe he had known all along that he would have had to live on without her, but there was never a plan. Before that moment, he was lost, until he finally understood: _You're hers, but you're mine too._

Despite this, regret cuts into him, a cold knife in his heart, ice water in his belly. What he would give to go back in time to protect his family from such grief. He had agreed to a normal life, but he was too naïve thinking their past wouldn't find them. Leaving behind the life of fighting hollows didn't make them go away, pretending they weren't there didn't make it so. And yet, the heat of that love melts everything away, if only for a moment. If only for a moment, even though he knows what happened to Masaki's soul, he allows himself a second's worth belief in heaven. Knowing what he does about the afterlife, is he being naïve again? He decides he doesn't care. Because if anyone deserves heaven, Masaki sure as hell does. And he just hopes she'll be able to tell him good morning again.

Isshin feels he can finally understand why souls become hollows, a hole of his own in his now heavy heart. He wistfully admires his sleeping family. With such a piece missing, their beautiful children won't ever dream the same—but the sun continues to shine in through the window. Even without Masaki, the sun still shines; but it's not something Isshin can accept yet, so he lets them sleep.


End file.
